1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a Digital Living Network Alliance (DLNA) network and, in particular, to a method and apparatus for storing data (for example, motion pictures, still images, audio sounds, and etc.) collected from outside of the home into a storage device connected to the DLNA network in real time.
2. Description of the Related Art
Recently, various home automation solutions have been proposed and commercialized. Home automation is based on the home networking which allows homeowners to, from outside the house, control household appliances such as a personal computer (PC); communication devices, including a telephone and a television; audio and video (AV) devices, including a digital video disc (DVD) player and a digital camera. The early home automation concept is based on controlling the household appliances independently, using the telephone lines or infrared rays, i.e., without internetworking of the household appliances.
As the technologies developed, home automation has been implemented such that the household appliances and facilities are networked and integrally controlled by a controller. Such an integrally controlled system is called a “home network system.”
In the home network system, the household appliances and facilities such as TV, laundry machine, microwave cookery, audio, air conditioner, heating boiler, lights, gas valve, and door locks are associated to a home gateway or a home server such that the household appliances and facilities can be controller by a handheld device (e.g., remote controller) through the home gateway or the home server.
Recently, home network system standardization has been progressed such that the Digital Living Network Alliance (DLNA), especially, is a standard for controlling household appliances. The DLNA, established in June 2003 and formerly called the Digital Home Working Group (DHWG), is an alliance of industry-leading members including Microsoft (MS), International Business Machines (IBM), Hewlett-Packard (HP), Intel, Sony, Matsushita, Samsung, etc. Among the aims of the DLNA is aligning the companies, having industry standards that will allow products from all companies to be compatible with each other, and enabling a network of electronic devices such as TV, VCR, digital camera, and audio components in the home. The DLNA has also focused on the interoperability between networked entertainment and media devices for personal media uses involving imaging, audio and video.
The DLNA defines a PC Internet Network wherein PC and PC peripherals such as a printer communicate; a Mobile Network of multimedia mobile phones, personal digital assistants (PDAs), Motion Pictures Expert Group (MPEG) 1 Audio Layer 3 (MP3) players, laptop computers, and similar devices that provides unparalleled connectivity and freedom of movement into and out of the home environment; and a consumer electronic (CE) network of set-top boxes and traditional consumer electronics. Also, to deliver interoperability in the digital home, DLNA has focused on industry collaboration, standards-based interoperability, and compelling products.
One of the especially key issues of the DLNA is media management and control which enable devices and applications to identify, manage, and distribute media contents across the stationary home network, or to transmit it to a mobile device. UPnP (Universal Plug and Play) Audio/Video (AV) technology addresses all of these needs for the home network and is the media management and control solution for devices developed according to the DLNA interoperability guidelines. Accordingly, DLNA has developed physical media, network transports, media formats, streaming protocols and digital rights management mechanisms on the basis of UPnP.
The internetworking for home network according to DLNA is based on Internet Protocol (IP), which provides underlying network communication for devices on the Internet and allows applications running over different media to communicate transparently.
For example, a PC or an advanced set top box (STB) may stream media contents to a TV in a master bedroom through an Ethernet cable to an 802.11 Access Point, and then wirelessly to the TV. With Internet Protocol (IP), all the DLNA devices can communicate with other devices located anywhere around the world through the Internet.
DLNA is likely to be implemented with a wired fast Ethernet (802.11u) and wireless Ethernet (802.11a/b/g) as the physical layer. Stability of the wired Ethernet has already been proved, and the use of wireless Ethernet, i.e., Wi-Fi, for wireless home networking has become widespread.
DLNA is implemented on the basis of UPnP AV architecture. It is also implemented according to UPnP Device architecture which is used for locating and controlling devices across the DLNA network, i.e., automatically configuring the IP address and recognizing other devices on the network with reference to the IP address, as well as checking and managing services to be provided.
The home network device category is made up of five Device Classes that share system usages in the home network. The five have the same media format and network connectivity requirements. Among them, Digital Media Server (DMS) devices assumes the role, like the Media Server Device in the UPnP AV specification, for providing media acquisition, recording, storage, and sourcing capabilities, as well as content protection enforcement as required. Digital Media Player (DMP) devices assume the role, like the Media Render Device (MRD) and the Media Renderer Control Point (MRCP), for finding, selecting, and controlling playback of contents exposed by a DMS.
Typically, the DLNA system enables the household appliances to share contents and to exchange the contents with outside devices through the Internet.
With the improvement of the transmission speed and quality, and deployment of the wireless communication networks, various wireless contents services have been commercialized with multimedia contents such as motion pictures, MPEG-1 Audio Layer 3 (MP3) files, mobile network games, etc. Also, the wireless contents services have made significant advances in the development of the handheld phone equipped with various functions such as a built-in camera module, which enables the taking of motion picture or photographs.
However, the handheld phone, which tends to become slimmer in design, is limited in its ability to store a large capacity of data. This becomes problematic for large multimedia files such as motion pictures and images.
Also, outputting the collected multimedia file using a household appliance like TV requires copying out the data stored in the handheld phone to that appliance. For example, the data collected by the handheld phone should be transmitted to the TV through an IEEE 1394 cable or a Universal Serial Bus (USB). The conventional method for outputting the data collected by the handheld phone through other electronic device therefore requires connecting the handheld phone with the target device and manipulating them to execute the several commands, resulting in inconvenience to the user.